Friday, February 25, 2011

Prophecies of Arab Downfall

How can we understand the prophecies from the distant past? They are written in a style we no longer speak (even if we understand the Hebrew) using expressions we no longer grasp. They refer to places from distant history that we barely recognize, sometimes indirectly by founder names or tribal names making it even harder to identify.

Yet our mesorah and our holy sages of distant generations carefully preserved these prophecies for the future. Some where fulfilled with the fall of the first Beis HaMikdash (holy Jewish temple in Jerusalem), others with the rebuilding of the second Beis HaMikdash, and still others with it’s ultimate fall.

But others waited from those distant times (over 2,300 years ago) until a future of the return of Israel and the ultimate coming of Moshiach.

Do some of them apply RIGHT NOW?

(This analysis is a bit off the cuff and written while I’ve been ill. It’s not complete or thorough, but I’m putting it out as it’s timely.)

Yishayahu 19…

1 - The harsh prophecy of Egypt… 2 - I will stir up Egyptians against Egyptians, and they shall war one man against his brother, and a man against his friend, a city against a city and a province against a province… 17 - And the land of Judah shall be to Egypt for a dread; anyone who mentions it to him, he will dread, because of the plan of the Lord of Hosts, which He is planting against him.

There are more details and they are not all fulfilled, but Egyptians are fighting Egyptians, protests continue after the leader was deposed. And both sides raise the specter of Israel as the secret source of their troubles.

Yishayahu 21…

1 – A prophecy about Babylon. The enemy comes like a desert storm… 9 - “Babylon (Iraq) has fallen, yea, it has fallen, and all its graven idols he has dashed to the earth."… 11 - The harsh prophecy of Dumah (Saudia Arabia): To me one calls from Seir (Jordan)… 13 - The harsh prophecy concerning Arabia…"In another year, like the days of a hireling, all the glory of Kedar shall terminate. And the rest of the number of the bows of the heroes of the children of Kedar shall decrease, for the Lord, the God of Israel has spoken."

Iraq has fallen in the near past, Jordan heard the call and took early actions of stability, Saudi Arabia is under pressure and is now trying to buy off their citizens. That should hold them for a year.

Yishayahu 23

1 - The harsh prophecy concerning Tyre (Lebanon): Wail, ye ships of Tarshish, for it has been pillaged from within, from coming; from the land of the Kittim he appeared to them… 13- Behold the land of the Chaldees, a people that has ceased to exist; Assyria (Syria) made it a home for wild beasts and raised siege towers against it, destroyed its palaces, made it for a ruin. 14 - Wail, O ships of Tarshish for your stronghold has been spoiled.

Lebanon, to be destroyed from within by Hezbollah and pillaged by Syria for 70 years. How long has it been going on already? Time for another round.

Iraq, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and others unidentifiable by name (the nobles of Zoan, the land of Tema, Kedar, Elam, Kir).

But it ends with…

Yishayahu 24

14 – They (the Jewish people) will lift up their voices, singing of G-d’s majesty and rejoicing from the west… the name of G-d, the Lord of Israel, in the isles of the sea.

The west, the U.S., and the Isles of the Sea, Great Britain. The Jewish people return from the west and the isles of the sea.